Team Hillary distancing themselves from Bergdahl swap?

posted at 9:21 am on June 4, 2014 by Ed Morrissey

The first hint that Hillary Clinton didn’t want to tie herself to the spike-the-football strategy from the White House strategy for the Bowe Bergdahl swap could be described as a dog that didn’t bark. The former Secretary of State held her tongue for two days, and then only tepidly defended the deal in which Barack Obama traded five of the most dangerous men in Gitmo for the captive US soldier:

“This young man, whatever the circumstances, was an American citizen — is an American citizen — was serving in our military,” Clinton said. “The idea that you really care for your own citizens and particularly those in uniform, I think is a very noble one.” …

“You don’t want to see these five prisoners go back to combat. There’s a lot that you don’t want to have happen. On the other hand you also don’t want an American citizen, if you can avoid it, especially a solider, to die in captivity,” Clinton said. “I think we have a long way to go before we really know how this is going to play out.”

Translation: As choices go, this was certainly … one of them. Clinton was smart enough not to climb onto Obama’s bandwagon from the beginning, although one has to wonder whether that unannounced “private lunch” on the previous Thursday was an attempt to get her on board. (If so, it raises more questions about Obama’s failure to notify Congress about the release of the five Talibani.)

Forget the bandwagon analogy, and think of sinking ships instead. Within less than a day after that statement, “former officials” in the State Department were busy talking with The Daily Beast’s Josh Rogin to explain that Hillary Clinton would have driven a much harder bargain than Obama, and even then may not have done the swap anyway:

Secretary of State Hillary Clinton was personally and intensely involved in the debate over swapping five Taliban commanders for Sgt. Bowe Bergdahl in 2011 and 2012. But she had severe reservations about the potential deal, and demanded stricter conditions for the release of the prisoners than what President Obama settled for last week.

Despite that the White House’s claim this week that the United States did not negotiate “directly” with the Taliban to secure the Bergdahl swap, the State Department, Defense Department, and White House officials did meet several times with Taliban leaders in 2011 and 2012 to discuss the deal. The negotiations, held in in Munich and Doha, fell apart in early 2012. But before they did, Clinton had a framework deal drawn up that was much tougher on the Taliban than what ultimately got done two years later.

Three former administration officials who were involved in the process told The Daily Beast that Clinton was worried about the ability to enforce the deal and disinclined to trust the Taliban or the Haqqani network in Pakistan, which held Bergdahl until this weekend. Clinton was so concerned, the former officials added, that she may not have even signed off if the negotiations had succeeded.

Hillary didn’t want to work with the Haqqani network at all, Rogin’s sources tell him, and didn’t like the idea of a swap for just Bergdahl. She wanted an end to all hostilities as a price for the release of the five Taliban leaders in Gitmo. In fact, that much is on the record from 2012:

In late 2012, Clinton spokesman Patrick Ventrell said the Bergdahl case was only one part of the overall effort to convince the Taliban to make peace. “We said within the reconciliation track… that his case was something that, in that track, could potentially be raised.”

In other words, this looks like a legitimate defense in regard to a serious split between Obama and Hillary during her tenure at State. It also appears as though the Clinton team is worried that this will stick to Hillary and that any future fallout from the release will do damage to her prospects, especially since her claim to executive expertise is necessarily tied to Obama’s foreign-policy outcomes. The fact that Team Hillary is aggressively staking out her position with this much distance on a key decision from Obama leaves the White House more isolated than ever.

Blowback

Note from Hot Air management: This section is for comments from Hot Air's community of registered readers. Please don't assume that Hot Air management agrees with or otherwise endorses any particular comment just because we let it stand. A reminder: Anyone who fails to comply with our terms of use may lose their posting privilege.

Comments

Please double down on your scorning of Bmore for cruelly “making fun of stutterers”. His comment was cruel, and such cruelty shouldn’t be tolerated on Hot Air. I’m glad we have righteous commenters like you on here to correct such behavior.

Please double down on your scorning of Bmore for cruelly “making fun of stutterers”. His comment was cruel, and such cruelty shouldn’t be tolerated on Hot Air. I’m glad we have righteous commenters like you on here to correct such behavior.

blink on June 4, 2014 at 10:47 AM

i wasnt seriosly admonishing him. you guys need to learn to have a sense of humour.

This is an utter political disaster, and with the five Taliban leaders on the loose in Qatar, the political disaster is almost certain to be the least of American concerns over the long haul.

I believe the tempest was stirred up purposefully, to blow out the VA scandal and reset the momentum of the coming elections.

Both Obama and Hillary would have known the guy was a deserter and a traitor from the beginning. State would have known from the moment they got the soldier’s file. Even on public record, the military refused to classify him as a POW. There was a reason the other soldiers were made to sign non disclosure agreements.

Hillary’s Good Cop/Bad Cop daily beast essay was carefully written. She needs to stand apart from Obama for her coming election run, she being the good cop.

The Daily Beast links to a 2012 State dept briefing, where Hillary’s spokesperson lays it on heavy about the dear soldier, whom State knew was a deserter:

(2012) MR. VENTRELL: Again, you’re referring, I believe, to Mr. Bowe Bergdahl’s case, Sergeant Bergdahl. As we’ve said before, our hearts go out to the Bergdahl family. We have great sympathy for them. We understand – as you know, his family has already decided to make his case public, and he’s just been held for too long and we continue to call for his immediate release. And suffice it to say that we – while we can’t discuss all the details of our efforts, there should be no doubt that we work every day, using our military, intelligence, and diplomatic tools to try to see him returned home safely.

In 2012 Hillary was working harder than she ever worked in her life to rescue the deserter

“This young man, whatever the circumstances, was an American citizen — is an American citizen — was serving in our military,” Clinton said. “The idea that you really care for your own citizens and particularly those in uniform, I think is a very noble one.”

Was it because of a protest or was it because of guys out for a walk one night who decided that they’d they go kill some Americans? What difference at this point does it make?

At this moment they want Obama to be on the defensive, they want Hillary to look better than him, they need to reset the election. They also hope to reset Americans to believe ‘what difference does it make?’

His history with multiple socks is known. He hasn’t always tried to hide it. He has wasted countless hours of everyone’s time here with his trolling foolishness. At least 2 of his socks have been banned. Ed should run an IP check on his socks.

For those soldiers it’s personal. Even if one or two of them are hardcore Democrats, party loyalty can’t overcome it. My dad (a Vietnam veteran) is as leftist as it gets. Bring up the subject of Hanoi Jane Fonda and he STILL gets angry! –

ConstantineXI on June 4, 2014 at 9:49 AM

I am part of the Vietnam generation. I was born in 1951. The draft ended in January 1973 when the Paris Peace Accords were signed. I graduated in of 1973. My draft number was 90, so I was bound to be drafted. I had no intention of going to going to Canada. I would have reported for induction, even though everyone at the time thought the war was a no win situation for the United States. As for Jane Fonda, she has apologized. Later she married Ted Turner. Turner sent all of his sons, which none of them were hers, to The Citadel for college. To my knowledge, she never appeared on campus.

If he is whom I think he is, he does this garbage on Conservative FB Pages, also.

kingsjester on June 4, 2014 at 11:25 AM

Schadenfreude thinks this kind of trolling is just great. I and many others here don’t.

I was an acquaintance of a guy who was an illustrator for a known Marvel comic book. A guy I used to be good friends with would go to his forum, and “jokingly” criticize his art constantly, and get into “arguments” with those who defended my acquiantance. The Koch troll has a similar mental problem as my old friend.

If Ed checked out the IPs of his old and new socks, and found matches, you think he wouldn’t do anything?

Do you know anything about setting up lots of IPs? It doesn’t take a genius to do it. Ed, I don’t think, is into technology as much…as writing and editing…the IT people at HA have never been too much into it either. Hence, the warnings are…well, to put it mildly, hot air.

Oh really? So you never said you were “highly entertained” by the Koch troll’s behavior, and you also don’t believe that being “highly entertained” by such trolling would great. Right. I believe you. lmao

non-nonpartisan on June 4, 2014 at 11:50 AM

Look, I’m not the HA IT dept. There is Nothing I can do. If Ed doesn’t address it, it’s all hot air.

Don’t you agree that it would be really fun to see what an IP check would pull up about certain usernames here? =)

non-nonpartisan on June 4, 2014 at 11:54 AM

and what would your justification be for this other than your crazed theories rooted in nothing but your own paranoid suspicions?

‘ed, i dont like this commentor because he says things i dont like. because he says things i dont like, and because i dont like him, i believe he is the same person as another commentor i once didnt like who would say things i didnt like. would you please check if this commentor i dont like who says things i dont like either \is the same as that commentor i didnt like who said things i didnt like and would you please get rid of him if he is, or if he isnt.’

Do you know anything about setting up lots of IPs? It doesn’t take a genius to do it. Ed, I don’t think, is into technology as much…as writing and editing…the IT people at HA have never been too much into it either. Hence, the warnings are…well, to put it mildly, hot air.

Unless the Koch troll uses different proxies when he’s posting from various names at the same time, which I’ve seen him do, the same IPs would show up.

Look, I’m not the HA IT dept. There is Nothing I can do. If Ed doesn’t address it, it’s all hot air.

Your peeve s/b with HA.

Schadenfreude on June 4, 2014 at 11:54 AM

I enjoy watching you tell others what their concerns should be, as if you understand how to run their lives better than they can. You have a habit of doing this. And when I see you first say that you find the Koch troll “highly entertaining,” then later say that you don’t approve of his trolling while telling people to relax and enjoy what he’s doing, I know you’re full of sh!t. And that sh!t ain’t beluga caviar. =)

The Koch troll, who’s not a lefty, would rather troll us than attack illiberals. You said you find his behavior “highly entertaining.” I have a problem with you and him over this.

Well, I did find it entertaining at first. I won’t apologize for that. My humor is morbid and different. Nothing I can do about it now.

I don’t doubt this, but I don’t see how that’s relevant to our conversation.

Have Ed ban me, for being off topic…idiosyncrasies abound, and I am full of them, Lord help all of us.

There’s no irony in telling disrespectful people to stop acting disrespectfully.

No, no, my reply was about you claiming that I have a habit of “telling others…” I really don’t care much what they do, so long as they fight the leftist thugs, or play a variety of music, or provide entertainment/tips in the Qotd, or such…

I completely agree. I don’t want us to be talking much about selfish trolls/fools like coolrepublica, frank, Koch and others, who like to pee in the punch bowl for their own amusement. Obviously, I’m not alone about this.

i wasnt seriosly admonishing him. you guys need to learn to have a sense of humour.

ThisIsYourBrainOnKoch on June 4, 2014 at 10:53 AM

Silly us. We should have known that anything which emanates from what passes as your brain would have nothing resembling respect for the feelings of others. We won’t make the mistake again of accrediting you with any degree of sensitivity.